Piecemeal Upgrades Pt 4 Data Protection

The Piecemeal Upgrade pt4

Data Protection: Redundancy, backups, offline and online storage.

With limited funds in a single PC household it is important to have a PC that is never down for too long. One of the key problems associated with piecemeal upgrades however is the need to occasionally reinstall the operating system. This can be a nightmare trying to back up documents, photos, settings, applications as well as operating system tweaks one may prefer. Learning how to properly maintain your data integrity is important to minimizing downtime as well as loss of any valued information. As the saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

Every computer should have at least 2 Hard disk drives (HDD), for more data security a third hard drive as an external storage solution is beneficial also, but should not be powered on all the time. The reason for this is twofold, by not being an active storage device attached to your PC, viruses and malware cannot hide on the external drive, and more importantly, despite excellent power saving features available in modern storage systems, every time the drive is initialized it loses part of its operational life span. The more HDDs available to a user, the more protection can be provided.

There are a number of ways to provide data redundancy from expensive to completely free.

Online DATA backup: Can vary from a paid service that will recover your entire PC, to completely free email services like Gmail that provide Gigabytes of storage space by saving important files as email attachments, and services in between that are nothing more than empty hard drives that you can access from an internet capable device. Backing data up online exposes a user to security risks from hacking, so one should never store bank or credit card information online.

RAID arrays (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks): While this method is hardly “inexpensive” the fee is more proportional to the amount of data that you need to protect. It is an upfront cost with no recurring monthly cost other than a minimal (12-27 Watts) of additional power per hard drive used in the array. It can vary from advanced multi disk hardware based arrays that will drive up a cost hundreds of dollars just in hardware and hundreds of watts of extra power required, to a simple 2 drive raid1 mirrored array based on software or firmware implementations that are less reliable and not platform independent or any combination of the above.

Storage Drive: A second hard drive added internally to a PC. The focus of this article will be on this primary method of data protection as the methodology used in this technique is universally applied to the other methods. This principle is called Proper Data hygiene. It involves keeping a second copy of your important file and settings on a secondary drive. This drive will see less usage than your operating system hard drive with proper Operating system tweaks to be discussed in more detail later.

Removable storage: This method can be a number of different means from optical discs (CD and DVD), USB flash or External Hard Drives, the obsolete Jaz Drive (tape backup) and Floppy disks. Of these options only USB flash or external hard drive should be considered as any serious means of preserving data for any period of time. Jaz Tapes and Floppy disks are easily destroyed and the storage capacity is not large enough to handle modern files. (The average 3.5” IBM formatted DSDD Floppy Disk can hold 1.44 Megabytes of information, which is about the equivalent on one picture from a 5 megapixel digital camera in jpeg format). Burned optical disks have an average life expectancy of 2-5 years, but there are many other factors that can affect their longevity. USB flash drives are great for a small files (network and raid/AHCI drivers especially) with external hard drives, being capable of complete backups that can last for many years.

Proper Data Hygiene.

The first thing any upgrader should understand is that data will be lost unless properly backed up. Most users simply drop everything into the “My Documents” folder in XP (“Documents” in Vista and Windows 7). A little organization can go a long way into not only making the backup process easier, but faster by not duplicating unnecessary data. Placing some folders in the Documents folder for specific files that are important also makes it easier to find files later.

The Documents folder ideally is for important files that you need to access repeatedly. Projects for work, school papers or grocery lists are just some examples. Most users however, consider it a dumping ground for any file that they want to use usually only once, and after a relatively short period of time the folder becomes congested with files that the user has no need for or desire to use again. What becomes more of a problem is finding the files that are necessary or important amid a collection of files with such user unfriendly names as AVS1234.exe, 125609.jpg and flrt6hm.DOC. Many times filenames on the internet are either some other users naming convention that works for them, or something randomly generated to create a unique identifier for search engines.

The best thing to do is create a separate download location for everything. When you decide you want to keep a file, you can rename it to something that will make sense to you, or simply place it into a folder where browsing through a couple of files to find what you need, will not be an issue. The organization style used should be one that is simple enough for you to use without having to think about it. A PC is supposed to be easy to use after all.

A couple of examples of a storage drive follow.

The first image is of the root directory of an internally mounted storage drive, a second hard drive installed inside a computer that’s sole purpose is to hold static data. No programs are installed on this drive.

The second image is a list of subfolders for more detailed organization of stored data. The naming of folders will vary based on what data is being stored, and these subfolders may have subfolders of their own.

Placing all important data on a storage drive, internal or external, ensures that no important data gets lost when upgrading or reinstalling an operating system. This policy should be used, not just for piecemeal upgrade paths, but for general use as well. Hard drives are mechanical devices, and repeated use of mechanical devices causes wear and eventual failure. An operating system hard drive is accessed almost constantly when a PC is on, and as such introduces a much shorter lifespan than that of a periodically accessed storage drive.

Backing up data for an operating system reinstall

Most programs store information in one of two places, within the actual install location under “Program Files” (Usually located at C:\Program Files) or within the Documents folder (much more common). By default many of these save locations are hidden from the average user but can be viewed with a few clicks of the mouse.

In XP:

Open up any explorer window (double click my computer) at the top of the window is a menu bar. Select tools, then folder options. Click on the View tab, select “Show hidden files and folders” and uncheck the box “Hide Protected operating system files.”

In Vista/7:

The process is the same, but by default the menu bar is hidden. You can view it simply by pressing the ALT key on your keyboard when any explorer window is active.

Once these hidden files and folders are viewable you can peruse through and select which backups you would like to make. Or simply backup the entire Document and settings folder (Users folder in Vista/7) to make sure there is nothing you missed. Before doing a full folder backup however one should run an application like ccleaner to remove temporary files otherwise the backup will be larger than it has to be, wasting both time and storage space.

Imaging a hard drive

Once you have performed a fresh install of an operating system, it is a good idea to make an “image” of your operating system. Software is available that takes a “picture” of your hard drive including the boot record, so that in the event of catastrophic failure, either via Operating System corruption or hard drive failure, you can return your PC back to that fresh install state within a matter of minutes.

Most backup software allows complete and incremental backups. If the software you have chosen (there a many types at various price ranges), allows incremental backups, you should perform the first complete backup the minute the operating system has finished installing, before installing any drivers or applications. In the event of motherboard failure, you should be able to change a motherboard out provided the change is not too drastic and use the image to reinstall. Incremental backups should be done after drivers and applications have been installed, and periodically throughout general usage.

External and Online Storage

External hard drives are a great way to move large amounts of data between PCs and laptops or remote PCs without Ethernet or internet access; more importantly an offline storage medium is much more resistant to failure than internal storage solutions. Directly copying files and folders from an internal storage to an external storage medium lets you power down and store your data in another location to prevent data loss due to disasters. Most external hard drives even come with some type of backup software that you can tell which files and folders to keep a copy of at the push of a button.

An alternative to the external hard drive is the NAS (Network Access Storage). This can be as simple as a USB hard drive plugged into a compatible router, a multi drive raid solution, a Windows Home Server PC (WHS) that contains software for backing up all computers in your home or a complete server that performs many other duties as well. WHS is a great alternative for the multi-PC family that is centrally located with redundant storage protection. High speed wireless (802.11g or faster) or wired Ethernet is preferable with NAS storage solutions.

Online storage comes in many varieties and offers many more options than a simple removable physical media. There is software to monitor certain folders on your PC and send any data to an online server that can be recovered at a later data. This is simple data backup and nearly transparent to the end user. Other options are online storage sites. Where you can upload whatever you want, to be able to recover it at a later date from any computer in the world, and even share that information with Aunt Sally, or Grandpa Bill.

External drives or online options are a great way of not only securing your data on massive redundant storage arrays without the hardware cost or electrical requirements, but making that data portable, so you can use it wherever you go.

Now that you know how to secure your data you can safely and confidently make changes to your PC without fear of losing any of your important data. It is important to remember that all things eventually fail, the more copies you have, the more protected your data is against loss.